Hello everyone,
Long time no see, huh? ...well... Sorry about that. We are game devs first and foremost. Community management and writing blog posts like this isn't really any of our strong suit.
This might be a bit of a long one, though, so I'll maybe get the things most people want to know right out of the way.
So. What is happening with Code.Breaker()?
Well, good news. Yes, we are still alive. Yes, we are still hard at work.
Like I explained in a previous post, we can only really work on the game part-time, so it's taking us longer to finish it. But.
Act 3 is around the corner, in with that the conclusion of Code.Breaker()'s main story.
Yes, finally, you can play the game through to the end!
To give you a peak behind the curtains, there are just two major scenes that still need to be implemented in the game, as well as the actual ending (or endings, rather) and another hangout session with someone other than Kate.
Yes, finally, you'll get to know another character better! I'm pretty excited about that, too.
Kate's dialogue was some of my favorite stuff to write, so I'm pretty hype for getting to do another one.
When will it come out?
Honestly, we wanted to release it on the anniversary of the early access release but... a little birdy told me that isn't a good idea. The game would get buried underneath the big holiday releases, and nobody would know we were ever here. That someone has a lot more marketing savviness than all of us three combined. So... It'll probably be out early next year.
Implementing the story parts of course isn't the only feature we are working on or want to work on, there are still bugs to fix and features to implement/improve. So, after the story wraps up, we'll be using that time to give the game a bit more polish.
What can you expect in this next update?
Well, the conclusion to the story, for one thing. More opportunities to get into more difficult hacks, of course. Characters that only have played a minor role so far will get a bit more limelight as the story heats up, too. There will be some bad endings too, as well as variations to the final ending.
Will your decisions lead you to the "best" ending? Who knows what the best ending will be.
Of course, we want to add more opportunities to hang out and get to know all the characters in the game too, so another one of these hangouts will be added as well.
Once all of that is in, we are planning on leaving early access and finally, formally, releasing the game.
With the game's release, we also want to launch on other platforms than steam, like itch.io, for example. Beyond that, we'll have to see.
One thing we wanna do is port and release the game on Nintendo Switch. It's gonna be real interesting to see how that pans out.
So... is that it? Is that the final version?
Not quite.
We still have features we want to implement, features we promised.
Rome wasn't built in a day, and game development is hard. Honestly, the hardest part is managing your time, really.
There is still so much we want to add, features we need to implement.
We played cards really close to our hands, because we never wanted to promise stuff that won't be in the game eventually. However, there are still features that need to be added.
Our big wish was for you to be able to hang out with every single character, to get to know them.
Part of it was implementing these sort of "watercooler" chats, where you have very few topics, but get to learn about the characters a little better by chatting with them. Those are more of a hidden little feature, though, and they aren't "mandatory". Just a little extra to flesh out the characters more.
The main event, at least in my eyes, are the hangout sessions where you really get to dig into them, really get to know them. The plan is to slowly but steadily introduce possibilities to hang out with each of them. Jay, Martina, Amber, Kate, Amber, Xiao... I feel it important that you have the opportunity to get to know them. It also adds replay value, of course, because you can't talk about everything with everyone in a single playthrough, and you can't hang out with everyone in a single playthrough either.
So, that's like the major thing we want to add over time.
I personally also want to, sort of, add an interlude that might shed some light on the events that lead to Code.Breaker()'s main story. What form will that take, exactly? I don't know yet. But I'm optimistic that it will be interesting.
In the meantime, after Code.Breaker() concludes, the other two will try and hammer on a new game. Will it be a sequel to Code.Breaker()? Something entirely different? That remains to be seen.
Code.Breaker() was kind of my brain child, so it will be interesting to let the others helm something.
Anyways, I want to thank everyone who stuck around for the entire time and enjoyed what we made.
Given the occasion, I want to be real and speak from the heart about the game, its development, and the future.
Code.Breaker(), for us... was an interesting project. Because it wasn't the first game we wanted to work on as a studio. Rather, we noticed during pre-production that the game we actually wanted to make would've taken us forever, working full time. As a small indie studio with basically zero budget, we felt forced to put the project on ice, and work on something more simple. A prequel, we decided, was the best bet. Something with a more self-contained story. Something easier to make. Something we could whip up within a year.
Well... Things are rarely that simple, as you can imagine.
We encountered a lot of hurdles, not all being related to the actual development. Actually, the majority of snags had nothing to do with the game itself, but rather trying to run an indie game studio. There were more days than I can count where I just wanted to dissolve the company and go back to doing this as a hobby, I can tell you that much... but we kept at it, we kept it together, and we want to keep trying. Having a company enables you to do a bunch of stuff that you couldn't as a hobbyist, but of course it is also a burden sometimes.
So anyways, What was that mystery project we had to can?
Well, it all started as a game jam game, called Room Date.
There, you were going on a blind date with someone. But, your character has this special power that allows them to look at a person's room for a minute when you first meet them.
You were then supposed to use the info you gather on your date, without clueing them into the fact that you were in their room. It was a fun little game that never really got finished (as many game jam games do), that was also still very rough around the edges.
This then morphed into Heart.Beat(). A cyberpunk dating sim about being a hacker, going on dates with people, and getting roped up in a mysterious cybercrime plot that could destroy your life and those of all around you.
In this game you would play a thus far unnamed hacker who had recently moved to Neo Chiba because of circumstances beyond their control. Now, they want to make a living in Chiba by working as a freelance hacker. Their good friend Kate would chime in and push them to try and get to know people through the "Heart.Beat'' Dating App.
In the game, you would take hacking jobs for money, spend money on upgrades to your gear and apartment, as well as go on dates with different characters. You get to know these characters by talking to them non-linearly, unlocking new topics to talk about through small talk and other dialogue topics. New events would then unlock, depending on how the character felt about you. You could maybe become good friends and win their trust, or enter a romantic relationship, depending on what you said. You might also say the wrong things, and they end up hating you.
It was a pretty ambitious project for three devs with minimal funding, all things considered.
As you might be able to guess, the hacking aspect and parts of the dating sim gameplay then later turned into what Code.Breaker() would become - A prequel to Heart.Beat().
The unnamed hacker being the same protagonist, and the events of Code.Breaker() being what leads to them moving to Chiba.
And... we still want to make that game. There are places, characters and stories that we wrote for it, but never got to make reality.
We want to come back to Chiba. And we will.
We learned a lot from Code.Breaker(). How long will it take for us to make Heart.Beat()?
Who knows. But it's what we want to do.
The future is rarely certain, and if it is, it still isn't. Nobody can predict the future, least of all three indies who just want to make games that are cool.
Our hope is that, if Code.Breaker() makes enough money to cover our expenses, that we can start working on development full-time again. That would really be the best case scenario. If not, it'll be more part time game dev for us. One thing we definitely know we don't want to do is ever give up on it. We want to keep working on these games. We want to make something we are proud of.
Well, I have stolen more than enough of your time with this overly long, rant-style blog post.
I'll be back once the patch comes out. In the meantime, I'll be focusing on writing for the game again.
Thank you for reading my ramblings, and thank you for supporting the development of Code.Breaker().
